~Some people believe we only live once, so have fun while doing it.~

Tag Archives: casual game

A few posts ago, I’ve talked about a musical game called Violinist : Magical Bow which was developed by rubycell. Today I’m gonna talk about similar game, also from rubycell, but with different musical instrument called Piano+. Piano plus, of course, is a game of piano simulator but there’s a special feature inside that I really love.

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I don’t know a lot about piano, aside from Do to Do, but I’m impressed how rubycell developed this game. The concept is actually similar to the violin one but the game mechanics is a little bit different. First of all, you’ll be presented with piano UI, obviously. This piano range is a little bit high to match the real piano, so you can hit the lowest note to the highest note. Now, this is a great idea, however our phone/tab screen might not be able to handle all that notes at once. You can, but the keys would be as small as strings thus hard to hit.

The game itself is similar to any hit-the-beat musical games. You’ll be presented the piano keys and have coming notes you need to hit with corresponding keys to produce sounds. It’s fun to play even though you can’t play piano at all. Sometimes you’re gonna mishit the notes and produce wrong sounds and make your supposed-to-be streak ends ridiculously. Sometimes in Piano+, you’ll need to press 2 or 3 keys simultaneously to fit the coming notes.

Moving to the song choices, you can browse online songs and might find what you really want. I’ve been playing some of my favorite songs including game and anime soundtracks. I think, the mechanism behind that online song search is some people out there making MIDI music sheets that can be played via this app. I don’t really know how they submit their works, but somehow, you can access that sheets by searching it from in-game search engine. Every songs you’ve searched would be stored on a list, so if in any case you want to replay it, don’t worry because everything’s stored.

On the other hand, I found some drawbacks from Piano+. This might relate to some people or it’s just my personal problem actually. Sometimes when I’m still in the middle of a song, the nodes just become invisible, I slide left and right to find them but no results. Then I press random key and suddenly all the nodes become visible again but in smaller size, breaking all the tempo. Sometimes the length of a node doesn’t suit the song at all. So when you’re holding a key of a node, then press another key that’s supposed to be your next node, you’ll move right away to that node, breaking the tempo as well. I think that’s an error and a homework for the developer for future enhancement. Other than that, I find this game amusing and pretty amazing, remembering how the music sheets are well-made and detailed.

OK, I guess, that’s for now, don’t forget to leave a like if you enjoy reading my story, pour me some words if you have any opinions or restaurant/game recommendations, and stay tuned for my upcoming stories.

CHEERS AND HAVE A GREAT DAY!!

I also do some artworks (in self-practice as well, actually), if you’d like to visit, you are very welcomed to my Artstation and Patreon profile.

Even a hardcore gamer plays casual games at some points, especially during break or spare time. For me, the best casual game actually is the one that can provide simplicity but resulting in immersive gameplay. Like this one called Ultraflow which was developed by Ultrateam. They created two installments of brilliant games with common game mechanics but executed amazingly to be a sophisticated games. Both installments are very similar only a few features added.

As you can see on some screen captures above, the graphic style is really minimalist. It’s more like simple vector shapes including circles, triangles, squares, and several polygons. It’s featured with monochromatic theme, only 2 colors available per stage (even it’s constantly changing per stage), the background and the object. There’s no time limit nor timer system in this game, so, take your time to plan your moves.

Your only goal is sending that circular object/avatar with numbers inside, to its place (the other circular object which is slightly bigger and have nothing inside it). When you can reach the goal’s outline, your object will be automatically dragged inside, so don’t worry if you don’t hit the object precisely. The way you send it to the goal is by flicking (swiping your phone screen) to a specific trajectory and bounce it so it will eventually get inside the goal. BUT, you cannot freely bounche it off. The number inside the object, and bottom of the screen indicate the amount of bounces you can actually do. If it exceed, then, POOF!, game over. So make sure to calculate the path properly.

As you progress through the games, the obstacles and panels would be so vary. You can face some panels like hyper bouncing objects, specific direction-go objects, destructible objects, and many more. All you need is turn them into your advantages, to reach your goal ultimately. Sometimes, the unexpected happened, especially if you miss-flick the trajectory but somehow it leads directly to the goal. 😀

Being designed so simple, Ultraflow is really mesmerizing. Playing just a few levels won’t be enough. Without realizing, you’ll play this game all along or few hours, at least that’s what happened to me. The sensation of anger when your trajectories aren’t working even you think that’s the best possibilities really give some additional plus point. So far, I still have no complain for this game, though. 😀

Anyway, if you have ideas, opinions, game recommendations, just leave me some words on the comment section, give like if you enjoy reading my stories, and see you on my next experience :D.

CHEERS AND HAVE A GREAT DAY!!

I also do some artworks (in self-practice as well, actually), if you’d like to visit, you are very welcomed to my Artstation and Patreon profile.

Casual games are really good for any people with a little spare time or even hardcore gamers. Not long after I discovered Showa Candy Shop, another game with similar style popped up in my Google Play search results. The mechanism was just too similar and obviously it’s developed by the same creator, Gagex Co., Ltd.. It’s called Oden Cart A Heartwarming Tale. Seems like this developer really love making this kind of soothing and heartwarming game. Upon I checked the developer itself, it’s indeed a lot of similar games were displayed, but most of them were in Japanese. Too bad I don’t understand Japanese that much. 😦

Anyway, the gameplay is more or less the same, but the story isn’t. Let’s take a look at the graphic style first..

This is just the cover home screen and there’s stated ‘The strangely moving tale..’. Well, it’s true whatsoever, hahahah. Even it’s just a simple and casual game, the storyline is pretty interesting to follow.

In Oden Cart A Heartwarming Tale, you’ll be taking role of an oden seller that will manage your oden cart to bring more customers to come. Whenever customers come, they will start to do some talk to you and you will listen to them. Each topics are represented by speech bubble.

Your sale would depend on how often you listen to the customers. The speech bubbles would be indicated in some different colors, depending on how deep the topic/conversation is. Sometimes the oden seller (you) will give responses to the customers. Don’t worry, the game will do it for you. Your only job is to read them as it’s just a storyline-based game mechanism. All you need to do is just to tap that bubbles to ‘listen’.

You’ll get about 12 types of customer, which have their own oden preferences. Being that way, the first rule is don’t forget to refill your oden cart if you’re going idle. Oden Cart A Heartwarming Tale is an idle game, so you don’t need to open the app for God-knows how long. Second rule is, if you want a specific customer to come, make sure to check his/her favorite type of oden. That strategy will directly result in that customer to come. The customers have 4 states ranking from very conscious to very drunk. The more you listen to their stories, the faster the customers to get drunk and order a lot of odens. Each customers have their own ending stories as well, but some of them are connected to another customers. I won’t spoil the story here, but it’s totally worth it to play this game and follow along with the storyline. Besides, it’s free to downloa as well.

Playing this kind of game brings such good mood. Great storyline, easy to play, cute graphics, and heartwarming musics. Casual gamers who loves story-based games would really love Oden Cart A Heartwarming Tale. I hope Gagex Co. as the developer would create English-translated similar games :D. Anyway, thank you for being with me until this very line, give like if you enjoy reading my stories, pour some comments if you have ideas or opinions or recommendations, and see you next time!

CHEERS AND HAVE A GREAT DAY!!

I also do some artworks (in self-practice as well, actually), if you’d like to visit, you are very welcomed to my Artstation and Patreon profile.

Back on the time when I got this game, I barely know what new game should I explored. Despite being a hardcore game, I also love casual and light games only to fill up my spare time. Then I found this developer, Gagex Co.,Ltd. which has several casual games and I checked out 2 of them.

The first game I played is this candy-shop-themed game named Showa Candy Shop. There are 2 installments of this series already but I only played the 2nd installment. Since both the 1st and 2nd have similar gameplay (yes, I already installed 2 of them), I decided to keep the 2nd only and finish it thoroughly.

This game is a real gem, really. Showa Candy Shop 2 offers a simple and cool casual gaming experience with amazing game design. You’ll take a role of an old lady owning and managing a small candy shop (also sells toys) during Japan’s Showa era. You have one main mission to complete the game which is getting mails to complete the story of her families who are going out of the city. I won’t spoil anything here, just play the game by yourself and feel the great nuance.

As you can see, the graphic style is more into cute chibi-cartoon style with bright and soft tones of colors. I’m pretty sure this style of coloring doesn’t make your eyes tired quickly so you can play this game for quite a long time in one run. The nuance is very powerful in this game with that distant crowd noise, food sellers sound, chit chat, and many more.

The gameplay is pretty simple, yet making it not boring at all. First thing first is, you need to supply your shop with stuffs to attract children to come and buy something. They will give money to keep you with resupplying things. Some children have their own preferences in stuffs, so make sure to check the requirement in catalog in order to attract some specific children to come. Some children will leave mementos for collection and at some certain points in the game, specially after idle state (it’s an idle game, so it’s OK to leave for a while, just make sure it’s fully supplied before you leave), you’re gonna get letters which is the progress of the main storyline. Your other side mission is to collect every mementos, customers, and gachapon (capsule toys/goodies). Well, I finally got them 100%. It took some time but it’s worth it :D. The capsule toys were the ones that took quite a while to collect.

There’re 2 screen which is the front side of the shop and the inner part of the home. There’s a button on the upper left side that if you tap it, it will move you to the other screen. Customers will visit both part of the house, so make sure to check both of them frequently. Usually the letters and mementos are left on the 2nd screen (inner home).

The nuance is so calming with that cute graphics like I stated earlier, plus the soft and heartwarming music. That is so cool! You can even use the music for sleep therapy if you would, hahaha. Showa Candy Shop is a great game, suitable for casual gamers who’re not seeking any thrills, score, or hardcore challenges. If you’re in that criteria, this is your game! Besides, it’s free to download. :D. I’m still exploring new games to play so if you have any recommendations, opinions or idea, just pour it in the comment sections, give like if you enjoy reading my experiences, and see you next time with some new stories.

CHEERS AND HAVE A GREAT DAY!!

I also do some artworks (in self-practice as well, actually), if you’d like to visit, you are very welcomed to my Artstation and Patreon profile.